Proper 10
Psalm 25:1-9; Deuteronomy 30:9-14; Colossians 1:1-14; Luke 10:25-37
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I.
The shock and grief surrounding the Texas floods over the Fourth of July continued to reverberate this week.
The devastation of Camp Mystic, a Christian girls’ camp in Hunt, Texas, hit home.
One meme depicted little girls running with smiles into the arms of Jesus. Another AI-generated clip showed Jesus wading through floodwaters, guiding several children by hand to safety — in heaven.
This is a touching response to raw grief. I admit to sharing these posts with fellow pastors and to tearing up myself.
The problem with this kind of overly sentimental response to grief is that, once it wears off, it can leave a person wondering where God was in the flood.
After all, whatever we care to imagine happening in heaven, Jesus didn’t come down to earth to rescue those girls and deliver them to the waiting arms of their terrified parents. This is exactly the kind of tragedy that inspires anger toward God among churchgoers and draws mocking scorn from unbelievers.
But it is also the kind of event that forces Christians to grapple with the nature of God, with who He is, both what He chooses to reveal and chooses not reveal about Himself and His divine will.
II.
While sentimental memes dodge the hard questions about God’s will in disasters like Camp Mystic, today’s Scriptures—Deuteronomy and Luke—demand that we face the simple truth of what God actually commands us to do.
In Luke 10, Jesus gives us an exposition of justification by faith, but He puts it in terms of the law—the revealed will of God.
I preached the last two Sundays about the law-word of God. I said God gave us His law to use as a spiritual weapon, to go on the offensive against Satan and the kingdom of this world.
I stressed that even though the law is spiritual, we can still expect material results. The law of God is nothing less than the divinely appointed means for improving both our civic and personal lives.
Last week, we saw Jesus commission seventy evangelists to preach the law of the kingdom of God in “every town and place where he himself was about to come.”
This week, Jesus confronts a man, a lawyer, who seeks to justify himself by the law apart from the plain meaning of God’s revealed will.
Jesus makes it quite clear in the parable of the Good Samaritan that we always have a duty to obey the revealed will of God, whether that will is revealed to us in the Old Testament (traditionally called the law) or the New Testament (usually called the gospel).
In Luke 10:25 we meet a lawyer who first tests Jesus and then, in verse 29, desires to justify himself.
Luke writes in 10:25, “A lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, ‘Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?’” Luke 10:29 continues, “desiring to justify himself, [he] said to Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’”
Today, these are what we call “gotcha” questions.
Now, what do I mean by a “gotcha” question? A “gotcha” question is a question about a serious topic that is not asked in good faith.
A question about how to inherit eternal life is serious, but Luke tells us the lawyer isn’t asking it in good faith. He’s trying to “put [Jesus] to the test.”
An example you may have experienced yourself might have to do with your Christian faith and why you believe what you believe.
The Texas floods present an easy opportunity for a “gotcha” question.
If prayer works, then why weren’t our prayers for rescue answered? If God’s providence preserves His creatures, then why didn’t God preserve the lives of these Christian girls? If the flood had taken out a camp of MS-13 members we would say, “God is just. The wicked get what they deserve.” But we can’t say that here.
In our reading from Luke, we’re dealing with two “gotcha” questions. Jesus handles them in His typical way. He tells a parable.
The well-known parable of the Good Samaritan is synonymous with doing good, with charity. Hospitals are named after the Good Samaritan.
But this is not really a story about charity, it’s about our duty to keep the law.
It turns out that charity and mercy are requirements of God’s law. The lawyer knows this, hence his set of “gotcha” questions.
Charity isn’t something that comes only from the goodness of our hearts. Rather, God’s law imposes on us the duty, the obligation, to be charitable and merciful to our neighbors.
This demands we start acting like real neighbors.
Jesus asked the lawyer, “‘Which of these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?’ He said, ‘The one who showed mercy on him.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘Go and do likewise.’”
The lawyer understands perfectly what he is supposed to do. So why does he first tempt Jesus and then try to justify himself before Him?
The lawyer’s ‘gotcha’ questions expose more than his hypocrisy—they reveal a rotten heart that we all share, a stubborn refusal to obey God’s plain law, which Deuteronomy and Luke lay bare.
The law is God’s will revealed. The law is what God wills to be done for and by His creatures. This is why it is called a covenant. If we do this, then God will do likewise.
Our reading from Deuteronomy 30:8 this morning says, “you shall again obey the voice of the Lord, and keep all his commandments which I command you this day…” and, verse 9: “The Lord your God will make you abundantly prosperous in all the work of your hand, in the fruit of your body, and in the fruit of your cattle, and in the fruit of your ground.”
Notice first that, once again, the effect of the spiritual on the material. Keeping the law is spiritual yet it produces material wealth.
Notice second that it is reciprocal, it is almost as if God is bound by our faith to act according to His law. God honors His covenant when we obey, not when we pine for answers He hasn’t given. The test of our faith is obedience to His law. Obedience, not understanding, even though we’re desperate to understand why God allows a tragedy like these floods to happen.
What is it that the lawyer, to whom the parable is addressed, and the priest and the Levite, characters in the parable, have in common? All three of them are experts.
The lawyer has mastered the law with all its complex applications. The priest knows the secrets of the temple, especially the correct pronunciation of the Holy Name of God. The Levite is his acolyte in the temple, preserving and enhancing its lore and mystique.
These so-called experts might try to explain the Texas tragedy with nonsense explanations only they believe: karma, white guilt, climate change, cloud seeding, or Donald Trump. I heard each of these explanations last week.
But this is the very opposite of God’s law. It is the very opposite of what God says to Moses in Deuteronomy 30:11-14,
“For this commandment which I command you this day is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will go up for us to heaven, and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us, and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ But the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.”
IV.
Clearly, God doesn’t expect us to be experts when it comes to understanding and obeying His revealed will. Jesus confounds their “expertise,” showing us in the Good Samaritan and His own cross what obedience really looks like.
In other words, God says, “Focus on what is revealed plainly, not what's hidden in obscurity and not meant for you to know. Stick to what you understand.”
This is why the parable of the Good Samaritan is so powerful. The Samaritan saw a need. He understood what needed to be done and he did it.
Luke tells us, “he had compassion, and went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; then he set him on his own beast and brought him to an inn, and took care of him.” The Samaritan didn’t act out of sentimental concern, but from a sense of duty.
Paul says something similar about God the Father in today’s reading from Colossians, only this is addressed to our own plight, as wounded men and women lying in the ditch of our own sins.
He writes in 1:13-14, “He [God the Father] has delivered us from the dominion of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”
This is how God’s hidden plan is revealed in time. It was revealed from the beginning that we have a duty of mercy towards our neighbor, but it remained a secret until Christ came just how God considered Himself our neighbor: that He was willing to cross the road of death to rescue us.
God told Moses, “the word is very near you” a point which Jesus, the incarnate word of God, later proved.
Paul describes this a few verses later, in Colossians 1:26, as “the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now made manifest to his saints.”
I think what got the Jews of Jesus’ day in trouble was making the law into a national standard, a badge of Jewish identity, rather than seeing it as the universal covenant God had written on the hearts of all men.
Jeremiah 31:33 God says, “I will put my law within them, and I will write it upon their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”
Paul writes in Romans 1:19-20, “For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made.”
The Bible is clear: this law of God, which reflects His will, is already in us. The lawyer, the priest, and the Levite forgot this, or, as Paul would say, “by their wickedness suppress the truth” (Romans 1:18).
V.
If the lawyer suppressed God’s truth with his smug questions, today’s sentimentalists do worse, subverting Christ’s saving law with feel-good lies. Here’s how we can fight back.
The problem with sentimentalism is that it exposes us to the threat of manipulation by the enemies of God.
The truth is that we know enough to obey the will of God. That much has been revealed. We know that death is not natural, it is not a part of life. It entered the world through sin.
Ezekiel 18:23 tells us that God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked while Psalm 116:15 tells us, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints.”
Human reason expects the exact opposite. Human reason would expect God to take pleasure in meting out justice, to delight in the death of the murderous criminals and to mourn, as we do, at the loss of precious Christian lives.
Ezekiel and the Psalmist are not speaking of human reason, but divine.
Since human reason tends to think it has a right to know the secrets of the divine mind, it turns the law of God on its head.
Law is replaced by sentiment, which puts law-abiding Christians at the mercy of sentimentalists. (I’d rather throw myself on the mercy of God.)
Sentimentalists prey on our ignorance of God’s hidden will and our defiance of His clear commands.
This is why “gotcha” questions are so effective. For instance, take sexual sin, a sin far too many Christians commit.
“Gotcha” questions exploit our guilt. Secular activists ask, “So, you oppose same-sex marriage? Do you always obey the Bible?” Gotcha. That’s how they’ve hoodwinked many churches into abandoning God’s law.
Why do I call this sentimentalism and those who ask “gotcha” questions sentimentalists?
Because “gotcha” questions work on our sense of guilt.
The reason the lawyer’s “gotcha” question didn’t work on Jesus is because Jesus is not a hypocrite. He is not guilty of believing one thing and doing another.
There are two ways you can fight back. The first is to obey the revealed will of God as taught plainly in His law. The second is to stop trying to justify yourself and let Christ justify you. No “gotcha” question will ever get Him.
Let me close with a brief word on grief and the sentimentalism that often surrounds it.
The risk here, as I said at the outset, is that when the sentimentalism fades, we will feel cheated and get angry at God. That is the very real risk of any tragedy.
That is how grief can turn from raw emotion to sinful disobedience. God chooses to reveal what He chooses to reveal and no more. It is enough.
For centuries men and angels longed to see how God would rescue man. All that was promised was a seed. It was enough.
When that seed came, men and the devil conspired to kill Him. That death is sufficient.
Now, we are promised that He will return. We know neither the day nor the hour. All we are told is to be found doing our Master’s will when He comes (Matthew 24:46, Luke 12:43).
Psalm 25 pleads, “My God, O put me not to shame/ Before triumphant foes.” Wind, storm, tempest, flood, and even death may consider themselves triumphant, but their victory is fleeting.
When grief tempts us to question God’s will, this psalm demands we trust His revealed law, not our feelings, and act with the Good Samaritan’s obedience.
“Show me Thy paths, O Lord, Teach me Thy perfect way… For Thou art God that dust To me salvation send.”
He does salvation send. That is the whole point of our faith and of the well-founded Christian hope behind those sentimental memes.
St. Paul tells us in Philippians 3:21 that Christ will “change our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power which enables him even to subject all things to himself.” This tells me that even though sometimes our response to grief may seem overly sentimental, the sentiment is more than justified.
Preached on July 13, 2025, at the First Congregational Church, Woodbury, Connecticut.
Discussion Questions
How do sentimental responses (e.g., flood memes) hinder us from obeying God’s law, and how can we replace them with action (Luke 10:37)?
What “gotcha” questions do you face in your faith, and how can trusting Christ’s justification help you respond (Colossians 1:13–14)?
How does Deuteronomy 30:11–14’s claim that God’s law is “very near” challenge you to act rather than overcomplicate faith?
Why do we struggle with obedience like the lawyer, priest, and Levite, and how can we overcome this “rotten heart” (Romans 1:18)?
How can we show mercy as a duty, not a feeling, in our community, especially in light of tragedies like Camp Mystic?
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